Basically I’m a people photographer. I like people and especially kids. When I find a subject I’m curious about I look for someone who can teach me about it. The stories develop from what they tell me. By taking the time to get to know people they can share their thoughts and we become friends. I cherish these friendships. To create a book I travel and meet people who open their lives to me. I photograph, listen, and sometimes live with them. Then I return to my studio where I put together the words, pictures, and design the book.

There are many holidays in Latin America and each country has their own way of celebrating them. Jose’s parents came from Puerto Rico and they celebrate Three Kings Day. Valeria takes part in Bolivia’s Carnival. Cristobal from Ecuador celebrates the Day of the Dead. Zofía’s family were early Spanish settlers in the Southwest and they celebrate Las Posadas.

Camila’s grandparents left Cuba for the United States by way of Venezuela. Today the entire family, parents, grandparents, aunts, uncles, and cousins live in Miami. And when they are together they laugh, eat, hug, kiss, and play music together.

Christopher’s parents came from Central America. His father from El Salvador, his mother from Guatemala. He goes to the Martin Luther King Jr. Elementary School in Los Angeles. We meet his friends, teachers, and principal. For the harvest festival the entire school, both students and teachers, gets dressed up in costumes.

There are many neighborhoods where Spanish is spoken in the homes, on the streets, in the stores, and in the schools. We visit Marc Anthony’s barrio in Brooklyn, New York. His parents came from Puerto Rico and he takes us to see the murals, the stores, the subway and the people of his neighborhood.

Araceli lives in a house on a ranch in Oregon where her parents are raising goats, calves and chickens in the barn. There’s a lot of work to be done from morning to night. Besides doing her homework after school she feeds the calves and collects eggs from the chickens. Her sisters Alejandra, Marina, Daisy, and her brother Armando Jr. work to help their parents who came from Mexico.

Helena and Sebastian live in a house together with their parents and grandparents. Their mother came from Colombia and their father came from Holland and Argentina. When their mother’s parents retired in Colombia they decided to move in with their children and grandchildren. The house is full of cariño and love.

A book of murals from the cave paintings; to colonial church murals; to the masterpieces of Diego Rivera, Orozco and other Mexican masters; to the singing walls in American cities; and graffiti. Communities express their cultures, issues, and histories on their neighborhood walls.

Meet the Mexicans with all their diversity of races, beliefs, humor, warmth, and talents. The Pre-Columbian cultures that left behind depictions of their everyday lives in murals, temples, writings and carvings. The conquest opened up the new lands to European settlers and established a new race of native and whites. Paintings, drawings and murals tell the story of the Mexican people.

The history of Mexico as told through the carvings, pyramids, murals, paintings, and photographs of the past. From pre-Columbian times to the beginning of the twenty first century. The Spanish Colonial world that led to the nineteenth century revolution for Independence. The twentieth century turmoil both internal and external brings us to today’s questions to be solved.

The bustling markets offer their colorful variety of fruits and vegetables. Foods that were native to the region like corn, turkeys and cacao blended with the cargoes of sailing ships from India, Europe Africa and Asia to become the Mexican cuisine. Festive special foods celebrate a variety of holidays with feasts.